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When the tribe is imperilled, all eyes turn to the chief. So long as the tribe believes the chief is doing everything within her power to keep them safe, she will remain impervious to criticism

Public Policy / opinion
When the tribe is imperilled, all eyes turn to the chief. So long as the tribe believes the chief is doing everything within her power to keep them safe, she will remain impervious to criticism
Jacina Ardern at the podium

By Chris Trotter*

It's funny, the things you think of at significant historical moments. Listening to Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern confirm that the Omicron variant of Covid-19 is now abroad in the North and South Islands of New Zealand, I thought of [a quote by] Abraham Lincoln.

In his second Inaugural Address, President Lincoln spoke about the outbreak, four years earlier, of the civil war which was then drawing to its bloody conclusion.

“All dreaded it, all sought to avert it.” Lincoln intoned. And yet, seemingly impervious to all human effort, “the war came.”

For the past few weeks Omicron has, similarly, cast its threatening shadow: a relentless enemy force whose advance can be observed, but not deflected. Mesmerising, and, for the immune-compromised – terrifying. No doubt the Government and its advisers, dreading its arrival, have been casting about them desperately for some practical means of averting it. And yet, Omicron has come.

Clearly, the Prime Minister and her team, their bright optimism at the Beehive podium notwithstanding, are expecting the worst. The three stages, or “scenarios” of resistance, outlined by Ardern and her Director-General of Health, Ashley Bloomfield, on Sunday, 23 January, anticipate a relentless rise in the number of cases well beyond New Zealanders’ experience of the pandemic to date.

A military person would recognise immediately the principle at work in the Government’s strategy: “defence-in-depth.” Sequences of resistance have been defined: positions from which, when defeat appears imminent, the defenders can pull back to new lines of defence. The hope being that, before any further resistance becomes impossible, the enemy’s attack will, itself, have ground to a halt. At this critical point, unable to advance any further, he will begin to fall back. Exhausted – if not defeated.

The problem with the defence-in-depth strategy is that it implicitly acknowledges the enemy’s superiority. Wearing him down is possible, but only at the cost of a truly daunting casualty rate. One of the most stunning examples of the defence-in-depth strategy – the 1943 Battle of Kursk – ground the German offensive to a halt, inflicting irreparable damage on the Wehrmacht. The cost was something close to a million Soviet lives. (German losses are estimated at approximately quarter-of-a-million.)

The challenge facing Ardern and Bloomfield is one born of their own extraordinary success at fighting the earlier variants of Covid-19. New Zealanders, in vivid contrast to the British and the Americans, have no experience of large numbers of their fellow citizens dying every day. To date, just 52 lives have been lost to Covid-19 since the Pandemic reached New Zealand’s shores in early 2020. In the worst case scenario envisaged by the Government’s modellers, that number could easily be exceeded on a daily basis.

How the country would respond to such a grim death-toll is difficult to predict. Undoubtedly there would be some – quite likely including many of the medical experts New Zealanders have come to rely on for guidance on Covid-19 – who would urge the Government to abandon its “Traffic Light” management system in favour of the considerably more draconian “Elimination” strategy of 2020-21.

Resisting such calls, especially in the face of terrifying case numbers and a rapidly rising death-toll, will be very difficult for the Labour Government. In such circumstances, the temptation to reach for tried and tested solutions is extremely hard to resist – as evidenced in Europe and the United States. If the Opposition parties are able to argue successfully that the human cost of flattening the exponential Omicron curve is wildly in excess of what ordinary Kiwis are willing to bear, then the Government’s present aversion to re-imposing lockdowns and regional travel restrictions is likely to be jettisoned without ceremony.

Such a victory for the Opposition would not, however, advance their cause by very much in political terms. The almost jaunty demeanour of the Prime Minister at yesterday’s media conference was doubtless a reaction to the central paradox of this pandemic. No matter how many mistakes a government might make in preparing for, and responding to, successive waves of Covid-19; and no matter how successfully such failures might be exploited by its political opponents; all is forgiven and forgotten the moment the crisis arrives.

When the tribe is imperilled, all eyes turn to the chief. So long as the tribe believes the chief is doing everything within her power to keep them safe, she will remain impervious to criticism. Indeed, her critics refusal to put the tribe first will likely elicit a lot more glowers than gratitude.

The bright halo of crisis leadership tends to produce a lingering after image on the retinas of the electorate. How else to explain the results of the latest poll conducted by Curia Research for the Taxpayers Union? With 41 percent support, Ardern’s Labour Party has more than held its ground against the challenge of National’s new leader, Christopher Luxon. If an election were held tomorrow, Labour, with the Greens in support, would be returned to office with three seats to spare.

The very slight up-tick in Labour’s support has taken place in spite of the fact that none of its key policy objectives are even close to being met. Indeed, on the housing and homelessness front, the situation shows almost no signs of substantive improvement. In addition to its failure to make a real dent in child poverty, Labour is also asking poor families to deal with a level of price inflation unseen for more than a decade. Against this backdrop, Labour’s numbers should be falling fast – not going up by 1.7 percent!

The Prime Minister’s attention will, however, have been focussed on a very different set of numbers. The astonishing drop in the number of community cases of the Delta variant of Covid-19 will doubtless have reassured Labour’s well-educated, middle-class voters that “Jacinda” is still deserving of their loyalty. It is in the eyes of these voters that the Prime Minister needs to keep her halo of crisis leadership brightly glowing.

As fear and grief rise in sync with Omicron’s terrifying spread, the Prime Minister will be careful to keep herself in front of the double-vaccinated and the boosted, whose children and grandchildren are baring their upper-arms to the vaccinators’ needles.

It is the catch in “Jacinda’s” throat they will hear as she announces the tragic daily tally of Covid fatalities. And it is “General Ardern” they will salute, as her Army of Five Million battles bravely from defence-line to defence-line to halt the Omicron onslaught.

And, because all Covid variants surge, and peak, and then, after a few months of mayhem, go into decline, the Prime Minister’s heroic after-image will remain imprinted upon the voters’ retinas long after they have entered, and left, the polling-booths in 2023.


*Chris Trotter has been writing and commenting professionally about New Zealand politics for more than 30 years. He writes a weekly column for interest.co.nz. His work may also be found at http://bowalleyroad.blogspot.com.

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182 Comments

Oops, everything this socialist says is a lie. The vaccines actually increase Covid as this UK data shows:

 

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2022/01/just-latest-uk-data-shows-covi…

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LOL. Here we have yet another nutter. 

This website is (in)famous for hosting the most extreme nutcases - in its headings it has the likes of "American Gulag" and "ProTrumpNews".  One of its current articles is titled "We are in a Civil War. It’s a War of Good vs Evil".

If there is one thing we do not need here in NZ, is this US-originated garbage, which only demonstrates the failure of the US public educational system. At best, these clowns might have some entertainment value, especially when they promote the most bizarre conspiracy theories that would make Qanon supporters, by comparison, seem almost sound of mind. And this is really something.

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56

One of the main reasons that global life expectancy has doubled over the last 120 years is that we've developed effective vaccines for diseases like smallpox, polio, TB and numerous others.

Vaccines are not new and they have an excellent reputation for being effective - and cost-effective.

TTP

 

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One of the main reasons for improved life expectancy is improved public health infrastructure i.e. sewage and drinking water. 

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The spike protein covid injection is not a vaccine it is a fragment of RNA that is capable of entering cells and possibly refolding cell proteins to form Prions - Dr Robert Malone creator of mRNA. The long term effects are still unknown but early information is concerning especially the refusal of Pfizer to release information and the total refusal of MSM and Elites to even debate alternatives like Ivermectin.

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Ultimately its a personal decision to get vaxxed or not. I went with my gut feeling and age and health condition. Had I been an over 65 fatty that was popping several pills a day for various health conditions, then I would have been first in line for the shot as you have nothing to lose.

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...or the non-mRNA vaccines if you're particularly concerned like AstraZeneca or J&J. Is there a problem with them too?

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The other vaccines operate exactly the same as the mRNA ones do, the only difference is that they inject virus DNA into you instead of RNA.  All 4 force your own cells to start producing spike proteins.  Adverse events from the DNA vaccines are worse than the RNA ones which is why they have been discontinued/suspended/banned/or designated "not preferred" in overseas jurisdictions.  The only true alternative available is Novavax, which the NZ Govt is dilly dallying on approving whereas Australia and the EU (and numerous other Asian countries) have already approved it.

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Thanks Keith. That’s exactly the case.

You dismiss the fallacious/misleading comments (above) and make things clear for everyone.

TTP

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Novavax is completely useless too because it uses old alpha variant spike protein.  More importantly, single-protein vaccines have proven to be totally useless!  They do not give you immunity.  Having some transient spike IgG in your blood does not equate to "immunity" where the latter term traditionally means durable and long-lasting resistance to disease.

Valneva uses whole virus.  The clinical trials are actually happening in New Zealand.  I expect this will be vastly superior to anything that's come before.  It's a moot point though because Omicron is harmless.  We should be happy that everyone is getting infected with Omicron and stop running after everyone with needles.

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NSW Government - "We know [vaccines] are not necessarily protective against you acquiring it [COVID] or breaking transmission."  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IEXXNaAonA0

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Spot on rumpole294.

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False. Totally false.

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The fist vaccine was reported as DR Edward Jenner's observation that Milk Maids who had previously suffered cow pox were immune to small pox.  Giving rise to the first western medicine vaccine.  Date 1796.  (there are other examples going back centuries of rudimentary vaccines in African and Chinese  societies)  In all the time since there have less than a handful serious errors with the process, affecting a very small number of people.

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So why, I ask you, does this substance not prevent infection and transmission like the good vaccines of old?

Why, I ask you, has it injured so many and resulted in the deaths of many others? Before you scoff, go and find out. Do some detective work.

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Good vaccines such as Varicella (Chicken Pox)?  

One dose

  • 1 dose of single-antigen varicella vaccine is:
    • 82% effective at preventing any form of varicella
    • Almost 100% effective against severe varicella

https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/vpd/varicella/hcp/about-vaccine.html#:~:te…

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Or Polio?

Vaccine Effectiveness

Two doses of inactivated polio vaccine (IPV) are 90% effective or more against polio

https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/vpd/polio/hcp/effectiveness-duration-prote…

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Cute trimming of your quote. That protection lasts for years, probably life.

Covid vaccine duration of protection is now being measured in weeks after 3 or even 4 jabs in a year.

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(a) vaccines do two things - reduce spread and reduce severity. The covid vaccines do the later very well, and the former fairly well.

(b) the allegation that the covid vaccines have resulted in so many injuries and deaths is straight out wrong.

 

 

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The US Supreme Court and Boris have blocked the mandates you fascist moron.

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Vyvyan, is that you? 

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Crikey. So the US is a bit stupid? Interesting theory. Get a brain please.

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The US is a bit stupid only on its good days, the rest of the time, well, look at who they have as president, he's the least worst choice... 

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Then I'd hate to know what NZ is... If they're so stupid why are they

  • 30% richer than us, and more productive by any metic you choose to pick?
  • Why do they have the largest economy in the world with 5% of the population?
  • How do they provide affordable housing with twice our population density?
  • How did they land on the moon or invent computers, the internet, air travel, nuclear fission, dwarf wheat, mRNA vaccines,  or CRISPR?
  • How did they save us from the Japanese in WW2 ?
  • Why do they control the world's reserve currency?
  • How does their navy secure global trade?

NZ is a pathetic joke in comparison 

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You answered your own question:

  • Why do they control the world's reserve currency?
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Mr fortunr has not noticed the cage being built around him during the greater part of his existence, and to be honest neither did I until only recently.

Consider the possibility that tyrants have evolved an understanding that you can exert a lot more control over a population with mass-scale psychological manipulation than you can with overt force, and that they have been developing the science of that mass-scale psychological manipulation for over a century.

Just look at what they have rather overtly achieved in the last two years alone! You will now accept everything your government tells you to do, obediently - even inject the very same substance three times into your body without any safety data available from Pfizer, only the word of politicians who have, in turn, been told by their global leader in Basel, Switzerland, what to say. And you question nothing?

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Thanks, on this wet dreary Monday I needed a good chuckle.  

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Just in case you have read this article. 8% of UK adults are not vaccinated and 92% are vaccinated with 69% triple vaccinated. So look at the charts and note how dangerous it is to not be vaccinated.  There are lies, damn lies and statistics but these stats are very clearly in favour of Covid-19 vaccination - just misleading headline and text.

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With no link to the data you refer to your comment is valueless.

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Searched Google for 'Vaccination rates UK covid'. Plenty of replies but searched my browser history - my numbers were lifted from a spreadsheet on this website: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/covid-19-vaccine-estimated-c…

Looking at it again I realise I chose the most recent figures (8% unvaccinated and 69% triple vaccinated) - to be a fair comparison I should have taken Dec31st not Jan22nd - the numbers then were 9% and 64%.  Still more than sufficient to make a strong case for being vaccinated.

 

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The statistics are in favour of being under 65 and not suffering from other health conditions (usually lifestyle induced). 

If you do not fall into the above cohort, the vaccination is very worthwhile.

 

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sunchap,

I think you have spent too long in the sun and it's scrambled whatever brains you might have had. By putting up this link, you have revealed yourself to be utterly gullible and unable/unwilling? to do any fact-checking. It is so obviously a site for dim-witted conspiracy theorists.

I feel sorry for you.

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https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10654-021-00808-7

I guess this data is a conspiracy theory too?  and that paper came out before Omicron!

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I'm with you sunchap.  This socialist government is a tragedy for New Zealand.  I see the government's planning on doing 78000 pcrs / day when moronic escalates.. why bother testing?  Why are quarantine hotels still running?  How munch money are those PCRs goign to cost?  7 million per day or more?  

In 2020 I was calling this government out saying that their response would be tantamount to dumping over 100 kg of gold in the Mariana Trench.  Turns out I was very wrong.  100 tones of gold would only be 8.8 billion dollars.  I was out by a factor of at least 10.

The tragedy is that NZ going to be a poorer country because of Labours ineptitude.  Meanwhile Jacinda Ardern continues to collect a $500,000 salary and the people cheer her on while the supermarket shelves go empty.  Welcome to the Soviet Union.

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NZ's abysmal lack of investment into healthcare facilities and staffing over the past 20 years is about to seriously come home to roost.

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Indeed. A career in medical in this country is underpaid. Its ok as long as 3-4x income applies for housing, but after that Aussie is simply way more money and a much lower multiplier than NZ. Do the math, as many have.

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It is expensive for a society to train medical staff.  The Aussies must be laughing at how Kiwi taxes are paying for their medical staff.  Meanwhile NZ is sucking skilled medical staff from 3rd world countries where they are desperately needed.

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Underfunding healthcare workers while we simultaneously have exploited them for our property investment wealth has been an absolute disaster of a policy approach. Stupid short-sightedness celebrated as "sign of our success", "good problem to have" over time, while we've blithely informed them they need to "do more with less" so we can have tax cuts.

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Yes. The TTMRA was a bit of a joke on us in that respect - the flow of skilled staff is mostly one-way

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I said that over 2 years ago now but hey guess what ? Apparently if it takes 5 years to fix something like healthcare its not even worth starting it.

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Don't fight the last war. Prepare for the next

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Yes Omicron has come ready or not & now  the evaluation of this government & its leader is at the crossroads, well & truly. If omicron should overpower the health system and the government is forced to re- introduce lockdowns, which may in themselves be ineffectual anyway,  and not re-open the border as stated, then any legacy of good management to date will be vaporised, very quickly. Reading between the lines words such as “as yet” seem to indicate that the government is not at all confident in the ability of the health system to cope. This echoes an article in the Herald a week  ago or so, citing ED clinicians as saying they are already heavily stretched. It really now all boils down simply to how well Mr Pfizer is going to protect New Zealanders from Mr Omicron doesn’t it, and that is because little else in depth, has been introduced or changed in the last two years in preparation for the inevitability of covid arriving here, in whatever form.

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Foxy not sure mate , here in QLD same pop as nz , 900 covid cases on any given day in hospital , most only stay 2-3 days.

50 in icu , and only 100 deaths so far and at the peak now and fallin quickly . Can nz cope with these numbers.............??

Chris Trotter . the army of 1 mil overseas kiwis wont forget either and most of us can still vote....

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hopefully your optimism is well justified & NZ can “keep calm and carry on.” What will not help that cause though is hyperbole by the media trumpeting daily numbers from Northland to Southland. For a start  as revealed in Australia, and here during Delta, not all cases come forward or are detected. Case numbers are meaningless & broadcasting headlines of  “big, big” numbers will induce fear & resultant distress.  What New Zealanders need to know is the capacity of hospitals to cope not only with covid but general admissions as well. Quite simply,  if the hospitals  sail through this in the coming weeks, then so too will New Zealand.  As such the government/MoH needs to daily publish a barometer if you like, of how the gathering storm is being handled.

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Foxglove I totally agree that general admissions - the "front door" of hospitals  - are not coping with current demand.  The wait times are appalling - even for people taken in by ambulance, and so already assessed by trained paramedics as being in a serious condition. Just how the hospitals will cope with Covid sufferers adding to the demands on general admissions, I have no idea. 

A lucky few in serious need from any medical condition may make it through quickly to ICU, but I think many will suffer for many hours out front before they are assessed and admitted or sent home. When I read in the last week or so a NZ ED specialist was quoted as saying that some with strokes are having to wait up to 24 hours to be assessed by ED and admitted for treatment, I realised just how understaffed and underequipped our hospitals are now.  We all need to keep ourselves safe - regardless of Covid - because it is a myth the hospitals stand ready to receive and treat medical emergencies promptly.

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Yet the Minister of Health has said today the hospitals have coped up until now and will continue to do so. Personally I don’t have much confidence in that at all, I prefer the let’s say non political unbiased expertise of the clinicians & associated staff that will have the actual responsibility, at the actual coalface, to correctly explain the true circumstances. So if they are worried, then I am very worried for the sake of all New Zealanders in this regard, if this covid outbreak runs as rampant here in NZ as it has, without exception, overseas.

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Surely a once in a 100 year pandemic presented a gold plated opportunity to pour money into healthcare.

 

That is the single biggest failing to date of this response IMHO. 

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Well they have poured quite some funds, paying consultants etc,  into the proposed centralisation of DHBs into MoH headquarters. Dr Reti in parliament has exposed this rather capably. There may well be some merit in this concept but it is ill advised in the midst of a pandemic. It has just undermined morale & caused uncertainty at the coalface, the hospitals  themselves that undoubtedly could have used such funds for improvements across the board. The same lack of nous at the same time, in deciding  that nurses and such like on the frontline, deserved a wage freeze.

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The head of the MOH said on TV in 2020 that the government had told them they had a blank cheque for responding to COVID but the single biggest constraint is skilled people and that's not quickly fixed. Meanwhile, healthcare spending per capita has been increased from its austerity years that preceded 2017 but is not near the levels we would seem to need:

https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/NZL/new-zealand/healthcare-spendi…

https://figure.nz/chart/c77PxswJK8z1pA2u

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Well, they did build a big new hospital in lil ol' Greymouth. Oh, and after 3 years, I think that the big new $1.2 billion (cough $1.9) hospital in Dunedin is almost ready to start?

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The tribal allusions grate mightily.  I can discern at least five classes, none of which have the internal cohesion needed to grace them with the 'tribe' appelation:

  1. Vaccinated with two shots and the Booster.
  2. Vaccinated but with less than the #1 quantities.
  3. Unvaccinated and no preventatives being imbibed
  4. Unvaccinated and with siginificant precautionary medications, like those distributed to the 200 millions in Uttar Pradesh.
  5. Vaccinated but administered offshore so treated as unvaxed by the Mandarins.

Commenters may like to chip in with extra categories, and with their weighting of the fealty each category bears to the Hermit Queen and her courtiers.

Mine? Class #1, Zero fealty, because,  like the Discworld which is supported by turtles all the way down, it's Spin, PR, and propaganda all the way down.

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waymad mate , Wife & l had 2 shots of AZ + had omicron , super immunity .

But will our Queen make us get a booster 1 day.....when & if we are ever allowed back..

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Amazing how many comments now start to look mostly like older men struggling to cope with a younger female being in power.

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Discworld only rotates once a year. You forgot about the 4 supporting elephants:

-MIQ

-Vaccine rollout

-What housing crisis?

-The pointless vaccine mandate

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So New Zealand is the final destination for this runny nose 'virus'.

In the middle of summer, lol

For the record: the world health organization has, as of december 2021, not recorded a single death worldwide due to Omicron. 

 Calm your nerves ffs.

 

 

 

 

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That is a lagging issue in reporting. Deaths have happened in Australia also.

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guwop

You miss the point . If any variant whether it be mild or severe is allowed to loiter unchecked within our populace there is always the possibility that it can mutate into something more deadly.  That is why elimination is by far the best strategy against Covid.

As President Roosevelt told the American people on the cusp of declaring war against Japan and Germany:  "There is nothing to fear except fear itself".    But in our current position there is nothing to fear but an unseemly bunch of anarchists, attention seekers, the uneducated and disaffected right-wing political nutters, all of whom have done their utmost to undermine the Governments strategy to deal with the pandemic.

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Elimination! Covid is unlikely to be eliminated overseas in the near future, probably never. So you must be  saying in that case, New Zealand must remain isolated behind closed borders forever? 

ps. your ref to FDR’s phrase is out of both time & purpose. 1933 inauguration speech aimed at relieving the depression hangover. The USA were scarcely involved in China concerning the Japan invasion until 1937.

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I see your Roosevelt and raise you a Benjamin Franklin

"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."

Covid is  going to be with us forever. Some people have just taken a long time to realise that

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That’s as good as it gets!

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Aotearoa/NZ, a nation forged by the sacrifice of it's young men on the battlefields of Europe, settled by Maori who sailed the pacific in canoes, gave birth to the first person to summit Mt Everest, Jean Batten, Willie Apiata, Buck Shelford.

We are an embarrasment, the world is laughing at us and I'm ashamed. The headlines that we may run out of toilet paper or that there will be 000's of cases, 24 days isolation. 95% of us will not even know we have had it, my daughter had it and did not know, picked up by a RAT at a casual job. We have become simp's, a beta nation.

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We are an embarrasment, the world is laughing at us and I'm ashamed

Don't agree with you there. The world doesn't give a rats about NZ's Covid situation. They're too busy taking care of their own situation and people. People may look at the low death rate in NZ, but to most people NZ is an isolated country at the end of the world so it should not come as any surprise. 

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NZ's response has been articles in the online editions of the FT, Uk Telegraph, UK Times and all the Australian newspapers. Almost unilateral condemnation.

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It is essential that the right wing propaganda papers in the UK and in Australia decry New Zealand's excellent management of this global pandemic because it shows up the utter incompetence and callousness of their own government's responses.

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The FT and Times are both left of centre.

What is callous and incompetent is closing the border to 20% of your citizens and running a lottery for a tiny fraction of the demand when 7 days home isolation is more than satisfactory. It is no coincidence the those defending the border are the small-minded Kiwis that never travelled or worked abroad. New Zealand has the harshest border restrictions of any country on the planet and it is nothing to be proud of.

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To be honest, those people that sacrificed themselves on battlefields for NZ would probably be appalled at what a bunch of whinging, self entitled manbabies a lot of Kiwi men have become. 

Especially the ones coming back from WW1, to a pandemic they had to ride out. They didn't even have Netflix. 

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100

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Looking at Netflix's share price performance over the past week, soon nobody else will have Netflix either!

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Looking at dumping it. Sick of everything they produce being drenched in woke bullshit.

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That Dave Chapelle special on Netflix was fairly edgy.  He said there were only two genders.

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I thought they went to the war all gung-ho and came back as "whinging, self entitled manbabies" refusing to take any more orders from the authorities.

Lesson from WW1 was don't trust the authorities and be very afraid of science.

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Let us not worrry about PR and a stupid race with the world. We are doing okay so far, with a few stumbles, especially in vaccination efforts. Let us give credit for managing it so far. Haters will Hate. 

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Weird how "but we did OK last time" doesn't seem to hold much sway with the virus? Why is there this reflexive need from some people to avoid objective scrutiny of our response? It seems like we're quite happy to be in a race with the rest of the world when people want to fend off criticism with "WELL LOOK AT HOW BAD OTHER COUNTRIES DID", as if it changes the fact that we were essentially lied to about vaccine rollouts, border testing and the entire response basically went on holiday over summer as if Omicron wasn't slowly stacking up in an MIQ system that couldn't contain Delta.  

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 We are doing okay so far, with a few stumbles, especially in vaccination efforts. Let us give credit for managing it so far. 

Mid-table among OECD countries. 4th from bottom for boosters. 'Doing OK' is a C+ grade. 

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Only 4th from bottom for boosters because most people aren't even eligible for a booster yet. Watch our position skyrocket as everyone that's been putting it off rushes in, and more and more become eligible over the next month.

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Only 4th from bottom for boosters because most people aren't even eligible for a booster yet. Watch our position skyrocket as everyone that's been putting it off rushes in, and more and more become eligible over the next month

The ol' Kiwi exceptionalism. We'll do it faster and better (even thought other countries have already done it). 

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I don't think this is the trump card you probably thought it was. "We're not doing badly because this can be explained by how badly we were doing before!" isn't exactly a game-changing argument. 

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This govt has lost touch with reality. 2 years to pour money into healthcare and the only sector we've pumped has been residential RE.

Now everyone else is solidly marching onto endemic status and we cower behind our drawbridge. 

Before you defend your socilast comrades, try asking them what thier long term strategy is. How does this play out over the next 3 years? 

1) How many of us need to catch covid before it dies out. What's the time frame at current infection rates (hundreds of years at current rates) 

2) are we waiting for a 100% vaccine? 

3) is our healthcare system really that bad?

This govt campaigned 1st term to fix housing, and they pumped it to the moon. 2nd term the promised to get nz moving. All they've done since is lock us down and make it even harder for those overseas to come back. 

Open up. 

 

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It's likely that 50% of the population is going to catch Omicron in the coming months.

Borders are going to be opened soon.

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I hope so. Father in law is travelling from EU to aussie for a holiday in April. Wed. Like to meet up.

Though Queen comrade was typically non committed when asked at the last interview I saw.

I really don't think they can handle the deaths or something. Easier just to keep kicking the hard decisions down the road. 

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The only differences between Luxton and his predecessors is he is capable of consecutive media appearances without producing an embarrassing or distracting clip or sound bite and "Team Blue" are pulling out all the stops for him. Luxton and his party are still chasing and promising the past, the Key era of house price driven neo-liberalism, which the electorate became sceptical of years ago.

All this talk about not Labour not having a plan (forgetting you have no public plan your self) and then with the benefit of it being a state announcement Labour gets to dump something that sounds like a plan (like they have been doing since this began), you don't sound serious.  I'm not paying attention to every press release but Hipkens looks to have beaten Luxton (and maybe Seymor though this would be subjective) of planning for infection driven herd immunity bringing the first to use the word "endemic", Labour can now own this as National we never brave enough to.

This is the same non serous party as they have been since English left. No plan or promises except pumping immigration and house prices. Pretending to chase the parties on both the left and right with their policy and ideas.

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No plan or promisees except pumping immigration and house prices.

Not much different from the current mob then.

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Yes but that's hardly a selling point. At least this lot look like they are trying to go somewhere else even if some have lost confidence in their willingness and ability. Pretending to try to fix things for the electorate is still an improvement on being so out of touch to not even realise the centre might want some change.

Labour have just started to restrict enough housing credit to effect prices. If they don't give in and reverse it we might actually see another direction.

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National NZ, Conservatives Canada, Labour Australia and Labour UK all agree with their governing party policies on most issues, but promise to do it better.  This is a very weak stance for opposition politics and is not working for any of them.  

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Defiantly can't disagree with this. On pandemic response especially. I can't remember National disagreeing with Labour at all except some superficial attempts when it disadvantaged business they made a few press conferences to keep them happy. National have never made a serious attempt to challenge lock downs and cheered on vaccination with mandates after the fact.

My only ideas for what's causing this is they don't know and will just defer to health officials (like the government) and/or are too scared of bad press coverage. Anyone got any other ideas for the cause?

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chasing house price driven neo liberalism --   sorry that horse is already taken by Jacinda and Grant --  The blue team could not even dream about 25+% rises year on year that the red team managed to deliver --    Done more in the last two years to destroy home ownership and screw the poor than the JK National government in history managed in nine years

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See above. I don't get this what-about-ism argument. So Red is better that pumping prices than Blue. Why would we vote Blue when that appears to be their only thing or even though I don't want prices to increase can I really vote in a party and hope that they remain so useless they fail to deliver the one thing they care about.

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Suggests that TOP or (potentially) Greens are more viable votes than either major party. The two major parties are too similar on housing.

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I predict TOP will get 0.7% in 2023. It is a spent force.

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I would like to see a new party altogether.  So many background changes to government systems are being forced onto NZ by Labour - with no mandate and little to no actual consultation - under cover of the population's worry about Covid. National has ignored the fact Jacinda is moving us towards what looks like making race an important decider of opportunities in New Zealand. In fact, Luxon boasted he spent the summer learning Te Reo - when I would have hoped he could have started an audit of what important issues need to be addressed in New Zealand to ensure equality for all is a top priority.

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Natbour have become mostly the same, except National being property investors want to exempt themselves and their mates from all tax and have working folk pay it all. 

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The concern is he's morphing from John Key 2.0 to Todd Muller 2.0, talking about a plan but appearing to lack one.

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Asking for a friend. Do you own the results of your vote in 2017 and ever wonder if you are part of the problem  rather than the solution? 

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Yes.

I've voted for National many times and never for Labour. Likely will vote for TOP next time.

How about you?

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"The bright halo of crisis leadership tends ..." Crisis! What Crisis? 

Housing Crisis? Poverty Crisis? Homelessness Crisis? The Terrorism Crisis?

Nah. Not buying it. They're dog tucker along with the gweens.

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Yep this country is going to be on its knees come the 2023 election. 

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I want to see some semblance of a strategy for the future from National.

It cannot simply be 'flood of migrant labour', 'push house prices up while exempting investors from all taxes, those are for working folk', restarting the sell-off of NZ to foreign ownership, and running austerity policy - including for our healthcare sector - as was done in the last downturn (i.e. after they ran up debt in response to the Chch earthquakes).

There needs to be something more, that actually addresses NZ's critical issues rather than just more can kicking.

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Agree.  Something more...trying to think what more they might do. 

Honestly all that comes into my head is 'top-down fiscal stimulus'.

They are just politicians in an age of bigger govt until currency collapse.

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I just received a WhatsApp message from my cousin in the UK telling us to get a backbone re our Covid response. 19 cases and we are lockdown again, the UK has 1000 times more cases and are just getting on with it. This Labour government is now milking this politically for all its worth.

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We're not in lockdown, today is no different from Friday for most of us, some concerts and festivals are cancelled, but thats it. 

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What lockdown....life goes on but a few big events cancelled whooppie?

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Right you are comrade, totally free here.

I'll just jump on a plane this weekend and see my family in Sydney.

Just remember to be kind. 

Anyone had confirmation that schools will be back full time in Feb? 

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Yep we are locked down and its been so long people can no longer even see it. Just keep on the Booster Bandwagon or you may fall off. People unable to return to this country and plenty of restrictions still in place, sure we are free and things are totally back to pre-covid times, not.

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That is some rabbit hole you are down.

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Carlos67,

"and we are in lockdown again". No, we are not and I must conclude that you are deliberately trying to spread misinformation knowing it to be false.. This morning I kept my appointment at the podiatrist and then went for coffee as normal. 

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We are locked in the country.

Not free.

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you are free to leave

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Great comment comrade.

My wife couldnt go to her mothers funeral 4 months ago cause of MIQ uncertainty.

Luckily She did go to see her 1 year ago before her mother died (cancer) but due to the MIQ booking shambles was forced to spend over 4 months apart from me an our two young kids.

How about we say something more constructive. 

"Open borders for anyone double vac, neg test & 5 days self isolation".

There, I did it for you, it's not hard to be reasonable.

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The UK has already passed the peak so will be relaxing soon. Right now they are fairly similar to us - masks basically everywhere, vaccine pass to get into venues etc. The only real difference between us and the UK is the 100 person limit to events, but do note that Wales have a 30 person limit to events right now and other stronger restrictions than NZ. Scotland and Northern Ireland also have stronger restrictions e.g. nightclubs have been closed which isn't happening here.

https://www.bbc.com/news/explainers-52530518

TLDR: we are basically in line with how the UK dealt with Omicron - your cousin is misunderstanding something or you are misreporting. 

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Absolute bollocks, i've got friends in the UK and maybe about 25% of people mask up in public. It's not enforced, neither are vaccine passes even up until their formal abandonment today. The population moved long before the rules did.

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I've heard similar from my family - they said ~50% mask compliance in shops etc. I think this is a relic of the chaotic response by their government, constantly blowing hot and cold with restrictions changing regularly and deaths piling up.

The comparatively compliant NZ public is a testament to a relatively good government response.

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Did you get any WhatsApp messages from the 100,000+ Brits that died from Covid? They're not getting up to F all. 

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Died from, or died with?

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FFS. The question is would this person have died when they did if they did not have covid. Answer 'no' = covid death.

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Any thoughts on the guy who got shot (like with a bullet from a gun), and was recoreded as a covid death?

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No one here has criticised the first 18 months of the Covid response, I certainly supported it. Many of the UK deaths were pre-vaccine and we are now 90%. Now however, with Omnicrom being relatively mild we have squandered that time and now have some of the harshest border restirctions and isolation time on the planet. It's completely unacceptable.

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Disagree.

If you start with Feb-20 and go forward 18-months:

1. COVID vaccination status didn't integrate with Nat Immunisation Register (should have been working on this when vaccines were first on the radar.

2. Zero thought on vaccination of hard to reach communities e.g Maori. Why weren't key stakeholders brough together and a team of advocates formed to assist with roll-out viz a viz new diabetes medications?

3. 6 weeks lost on confirming our vaccine orders so that it could be announced to coincide with election.

4. MIQ leakage and poor containment.

5. RAT widely available in Euro for a year? Pse correct me if wrong. Would be ideal as first-line screening tool prior to PCR.

6. No 2nd choice of vaccine. What would have happened if we had cold chain failure on a Pfizer shipment? What was the fall-back?

7. Confusion within Government about what our levels and steps actually meant. Hipkins and Ardern provided conflicting advice e.g. meet friends, but stay outside....but you can't use their bathroom as one example.

Cluster Fxck

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Just take a second to note the hyperbole in this article alone. Which words are being paired with "omicron"?

  • onslaught
  • fear
  • grief
  • terrifying
  • relentless

I probably missed a few, but you get the picture. This type of "journalism" does Kiwis a huge injustice, promoting panic and fear at a time when what we need is levelheadedness and rational response.

Omicron has no place being paired with any of those words, and it's disappointing to see Trotter resorting to this brand of cheap fear-porn journalism.

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Exactly.

Australia, 1m active cases, 400 serious.

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/australia/

Terrifying? I think not.

Disappointing from Trotter, but not surprising.

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Interesting, that site says only 400 serious but NSW's hospitalisation figures say 2,800 admitted to hospital https://covidlive.com.au/report/daily-hospitalised/nsw and around 200 on ICU.

Possible that the worldometer is lagging or reporting something slightly different.

Hospitalisation and ICU would seem more relevant to NZ.

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Mate they go in with a broken leg, get tested and get listed as a Covid patient.  How can you not know this by now?

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Oh, yeah, totally, there's no pandemic and it's all fake, I know. There's a massive epidemic of broken legs across the world right now, actually.

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Even better is when they die of gunshot wounds but are in fact listed as a covid death because they tested positive after being dead.

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Yeah, it's truly incredibly how many people with broken legs have been shot to death over the last year while being COVID-positive.

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Lockdowns don't really work with Omicron, many European countries where already in various states of lockdown due to Delta but Omicron still swept through the population rapidly. In many ways all it did was very marginally delay what was inevitable - the sniffles are coming!

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the sniffles are coming!

What's up with the rise of this sort of anti-intellectualism? It's bizarre. So much readily available access to medical professionals' and scientists' actual robust work and insight on COVID, as well as data and commentary on excess mortality and causes of death, and this sort of tripe is where people end up.

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We have been profoundly focused on the most negative outcomes like hospitalisations and deaths but the experience the vast majority of people will have is neither. It's very likely that half the population will get the Omicron variant and this is no time to be alarmist, people just need to take pragmatic precautionary steps like having testing available when they display symptoms and be ready to stay a home if they or someone in their family catches it.

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Sure, but sniffles have never had such negative impacts on modern hospital utilisation and availability of healthcare resources. May as well not trivialise it nonsensically either, right.

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We have to wait and see what impact the "sniffles" (Omicron) will have. It may turn out that the emperor has no clothes.

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Agree. Will be a pleasant surprise indeed if it's more mild for our healthcare system than what we've seen in NSW. Let's hope we see a naked emperor.

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That could be because excessive hospitalisations overwhelm the public health system, with major flow-on adverse effects.

And as demonstrated elsewhere in the world there are adverse supply chain effects as well, a consequence of combining pragmatic precautionary steps and a fast spreading Omicron variant.

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I think your post is the non-thinking one.  I have a masters degree in engineering, am I an anti-intellectual as well?  Or is anyone who disagrees with the government's narrative (which you seem to have bought into 100%) an anti-intellectual?

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Past education quite clearly has not precluded some from present anti-intellectualism, and that's certainly long been the case with anti-vaxxers, flat-earthers, 9/11 conspiracists, and various QAnon victims. Ranting about"government's narrative" yada, yada, yada just looks a bit silly and seems to be far more homogenous in rhetoric and views spouted

I have neither public TV nor a Granny Herald/Stuff subscription, and absolutely no emotional need to buy into some nefarious "government narrative" to understand the obvious that a pandemic is not equal to "sniffles".

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Rick, I fully supported the first 18 months, very pro vax and hate conspiracy theorists. I am appalled by our response now, I feel like I am being mothered and treated like a 3 year old. I am massively done, I want to see friends and family abroad and be treated like an adult. The Govt had 2 years to get health care ready and failed. That is the reason the border is closed.

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Oh, understand. I am sick of being in a pandemic too. Pandemics are really no fun, no fun at all. 

I am betting we'll be through this over the next 6-9 months, as Omicron sweeps through NZ. Seems clear the only play is to try to keep the health system on its feet.

Health professionals I've spoken to and read from have all been pretty clear that there is no quick fix to systemic under-investment in the health sector, something echoed by the heads of MOH and NZ's ICU system (MOH Head while saying they'd been given a blank cheque by the government).

If we want a better health sector we need to remember this come election times. We have an aging population and have run the system very lean over the last 20 years. Seems like a pipe dream to suppose we can rapidly ramp up a historically underfunded health sector when we need to.

None of which, of course, makes a pandemic equal to "sniffles".

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Totally agree.

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I have family I euro and aus, all in EU and some in aus have had it. 

All report sniffles. 

I'm sure if your in the middle of radiotherapy treatment then the outcome is less certain.

Its a hard decision yes, but Unles there is a 100% vaccine, there is only one way out of this pandemic. 

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"the Prime Minister’s heroic after-image will remain imprinted upon the voters’ retinas long after they have entered, and left, the polling-booths in 2023".

Perhaps, but it might be that just as Britain dumped Churchill after WW2 in favour of a left-wing government, NZ could dump Ardern in favour of a more right-wing government.

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Only to be voted back in?

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 I will now hold my nose and vote National. I really don't like them but I can no longer sit and watch our country closed to the outside world, scared of it's own shadow.

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Perhaps, but it might be that just as Britain dumped Churchill after WW2 in favour of a left-wing government, NZ could dump Ardern in favour of a more right-wing government.

I think the color of her underwear (political affiliations) is irrelevant. I think she could be dumped because of her inability to achieve any of her govt's objectives. 

I consider myself somewhat left leaning but the woke nonsense of the govt and their supporters has destroyed any motivation to be connected with mainstream progressive politics. I simply cannot connect with Ardern and her posse. It's all vacuous politics with no real intent.   

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“the Prime Minister needs to keep her halo of crisis leadership brightly glowing.”

Chris Trotter, there are many people that disagree with you on this.  Success for a country is not defined by how many Covid-19 deaths there are.  It is defined by a broad range of measures.

You rightly point out NZ is in a crisis. You don’t mention that the government needs to declare a health workforce emergency & that NZ needs 1500 more hospital specialists, 1400 GPs & 12,000 nurses to match Australia per capita. This was reported today by the Association of Salaried Medical specialists (ASMS) executive director, Sarah Dalton & supported by the Cancer Society.

You state, “none of Labour’s key policy objectives are even close to being met. Indeed, on the housing and homelessness front, the situation shows almost no signs of substantive improvement. In addition to its failure to make a real dent in child poverty, Labour is also asking poor families to deal with a level of price inflation unseen for more than a decade.”

This all suggests Labour has failed NZ badly & things are going to get a lot worse.

 

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Tony , way to much sense mate , cut it out , Omicron is not scary fellow kiwis.

We had it a month ago in Ozzy , slight 2 day cold , mid 60s.

Media have a lot to answer for now & in the coming weeks...

There is only one problem ...staff shortages

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Agreed Tony, borders are closed because Labour would/could not resource hospitals to an acceptable level.

There are a million Kiwis abroad, sons, daughters, siblings, aunties, uncles etc etc. Locked out of their own country. 

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It seems they have only just ordered rapid tests that have been in use elsewhere for over a year. Also for a variant that appeared in November they are now formulating a plan. 

In the podium we trust.

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2020-2021: "Slow the spread of the virus" = we don't have capacity to deal with high numbers of sick Kiwis, so let's reduce the potential strain on the healthcare system and WE can together keep granny safe...

2022: "Slow the spread of the virus" = we didn't upgrade the healthcare system when we should have over the past two years, so YOU can keep granny safe...

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Takes much longer than 2 years to upgrade a health care system.   

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Oh dear, is being terrified of covid the new virtue signalling?

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Partly, also it gives them a veneer of virtue so they can sneer and condemn anyone who questions even a little... Skepticism (even healthy skepticism) is not allowed.

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Yelling "woke" disparagingly at all and sundry has crossed into virtue signalling for Facebook-Talkback Boomers, just be aware.

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Noted, I have edited woke out of my comment.

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The thing about being tribal is that you still come out unevolved on the other side.

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God Chris Trotter is a twat. 

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Total agreement

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He does generate a good comments section.

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All she is doing is meddling. Meddling with our health system. Meddling & segregating our society. Meddling with our house prices. Meddling with her media. Meddling with her partner. Meddling at motherhood. And meddling at leading this small nation. Meddlers like her should go to the UN. Come on auntie Helen, find her a real job in New York. She's a global media star. Oops, that should read a global meddler star.

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Very personal and inappropriate.

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NZ seems to be doing the opposite of most of the world:

- imposing restrictions (when that has little effect on containing Omicron),

- shortening times between jabs (when lengthening the gap proves more beneficial),

- lengthening isolation periods (when people recover quicker from Omicron) and

- delaying omicron which is a short-term relief for long term danger (lack of natural immunity to future strains from after Omicron infection)

All the tactics by the government so far seem to say, "We couldn't boost the healthcare system, so you'll have to instead so we can spread out the wave. And it's cheaper to give people money to stay home than upgrade our healthcare capability. Also we've bought all these Pfizer vaccines so we need to use it up before it expires, never mind the gap between shots."

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That's because Jacinda aims to prevent New Zealanders from acquiring natural immunity.  That way when the next variant arrives in a few months/year she can continue shutting NZ down and locking us up into perpetuity.  Its not in her interests to have us all naturally immune and demanding our freedom.  If one thing is patently obvious from overseas, its that those countries with high levels of natural immunity (South Africa, UK, Sweden, half of the US) are having a much easier time of managing Omicron than those countries that locked down during the last 2 years (Denmark, Israel, Ireland).

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https://i.stuff.co.nz/national/explained/300502186/covid19-is-it-omicro… a headline like this yet the population is terrified. Its pathetic

Stuff had some help on the first aid kit you needed. Paracetamol and strepsils. Plus some hand sanitiser. Scary bug. 

So you idiots jab yourselves up the wahoo. Good luck with that.

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I've had three jabs and none of them went up my wahoo, should I complain? 

Omicron doesn't looks like it'll be much of a problem for me, but happy to take a virtually risk-free booster to my immune system. 

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If the Pfizer vaccine is effective against Delta and Omi is less potent, why the need for boosters?

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Pharmaceutical company profits?

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Both profits and effectiveness are not mutually exclusive.

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It does change the risk assessment for sure - less risk from the disease and less benefit from the vaccine. Still stacks up as worth it for me though as an adult in my 30s. 

Not to mention Delta is still kicking around as well - risk benefit of getting a booster is firmly positive in that case. 

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In my case its a no-brainer +70 < 80 with some mild, in my non medical opinion, co-morbidity.

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Pleasure for the wahoo.

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The numbers are absolutely pathetic today 25 new cases. I total 10 in hospital. We know that omi has been in the community at least 11 days now. This is a joke excuse me while I laugh.

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I only read the first paragraph.  Comparing Ardern to Lincoln.  Far out.  Trotter has lost the plot.

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It wasn't a comparison. He was leading to the quote from Lincoln and applying it to the pandemic:

“All dreaded it, all sought to avert it.” Lincoln intoned. And yet, seemingly impervious to all human effort, “the war came.”

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Wish I'd purchased Pfizer shares this time 2 years ago.  

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Pfizer weren't doing that well 2 years ago, so yep.

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I personally know two people who have been incapacitated by the substance injected into them. In both cases the injuries (which are likely to be permanent, by the way) occurred within hours after being injected.

These injuries have been ignored as "vaccine related" by the hospital.

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It's worse than that, the CARM system for reporting these adverse reactions isn't even mandatory for Covid.

Great way of sweeping anything and everything under the carpet.

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Yep and I bet if you put this up on social media it would get deleted and you would be labeled a nutter. Makes you stop and think doesn't it. I think that basically people are stupid, they have short term thinking and are unable to think for themselves. The narrative was get the jab and get back to normal and people are still thinking that Delta was the last variant, no wait its Omicron no wait its Sigma no wait its Omega no wait oh shit we have run out of Greek letters to use.

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Xi - that one is still available.  Let's end where we started.

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Nice!

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We could always use the rego plate trick and after Omega, go AlphaAlpha, AlphaBeta and so ad infinitum.  Bit hard to pronounce but  hey, what's life without a Challenge? That's certainly how Covid sees the latest 'vaccine' in it's evolutionary pathway-just another obstacle to mutate around.....

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Trotter’s main error is thinking that Omicron is deadly, throwing his whole thrust of argument on to the wrong track.

Omicron is mild, does not involve the lungs and results in virtually no ICU admissions, evidenced by international experience. Therefore Ardern’s micromanagement is overkill. But many sheep won’t know that and think she’s their saviour. Pied Piper more like. This is the government that squashed early treatment options, and has not made any effort to tell us that Vitamin D is essential to protect against covid as is zinc and a couple of other things. As for ivermectin they stopped doctors prescribing that too. No matter I have enough of it for 30 people both through my doctor plus the vetinarian version which is much cheaper.

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It seems from the comments that eugenics is very popular with interest.co.nz readers. From down their rabbit holes.

 

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There's always the MSM to read, Andrew, as that most likely aligned with your perceptions and thoughts.

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